Injured
by SereneT'gai
Summary: Spock has his limits tested when Lieutenant Uhura becomes stranded on the surface of a volatile planet while he remains on board the Enterprise. More chapters soon to come.
1. Chapter 1

He was seething.

Captain Kirk had insisted that he remain on the ship with him to provide atmospheric updates while the landing party beamed down to the surface of the volatile planet Starfleet had discovered only a year previously. As was so often the case with deep space away missions, what was intended to be a simple sampling exhibition had turned quite confrontational with its indigenous life forms, and now two of the four person team were dead, the extent of their injuries unknown. Lieutenant Uhura had of course been requested to translate their peaceful purpose upon arrival, and escort diplomatic ambassadors to the ship routinely, but the extreme incompetence of the security officer accompanying her had soured the operation when he pointed his weapon at the head of who was apparently considered a most revered tribal leader. The sharply pointed glass-like tool held out to the Lieutenant was meant as a ceremonial gift, and had been mistaken by the officer to have malicious motive, although the custom had been explained in their briefing.

He was an idiot.

Communication had been nothing more than faint static due to the constantly shifting pressure of the planets' thick atmosphere, and several solid materials reading on his screen were showing interference with transport abilities with no discernable pattern to quantify its operational time. Although the short diplomatic interactions with the planets' people had gone tremendously well, the Enterprise had been forced to keep its distance lest they be left waging the high probability of becoming either trapped in its gravity, or simply incapable of using the ships technologies in the heavy static formations below.

This was not the first away mission that had separated him from Lieutenant Uhura, nor even the most dangerous parameters, but upon receiving transmission that the security officer that caused this failure was beamed up without her, he could not be still.

The captain had been hovering near him at his station, obviously not oblivious to his mounting concern, and he did not need to order the officer to the bridge to be certain he would promptly report there. The clip of his boots across the tile was jarring as he head toward the bridge entrance, and he clasped his hands behind his back to keep from throttling the man who would soon appear. He could feel Nyota's quiet fear, but even that was hazy given her injury, which must have been to her head. He had quietly tapped his toe against the floor 73 times before the door finally slid open.

"Lieutenant Commander Walsh, repor—"

"Did you not get enough oxygen in the womb, or do I just need to fire everyone who ever taught you anything?" Kirk shouted, with his usual flair for the unprofessional, but he could not disparage him of it with his own sentiment on par.

"Captain, he pointed a knife at Lieutenant Uhura, so I—"

"Pointed it _at_ her, or held it out _to_ her like they _discussed_ in the meeting we _just_ had?"

"All I saw was him taking out a weapon, and I just reacted." He could feel his right leg begin to shake, and his hands tightened to fists pressed against his lower back. He was uncertain why he believed he would find straightforward answers in this man, but excuses were wasting time that he did not have. "I didn't know he was some sort of priest or something. We usually see at least a holo of who we're dealing with, but when it all went down, I just ran for cover, and so did Uhura. I called for a beam up, but I didn't see where she went. Captain, I assessed and reacted to what I thought was a threat, and came back to report. My job is to—"

"Your job was to safely return to me my wife." He would not hear another word. His tone was rather harsh, which silenced and turned the heads of every being present on the bridge. By the look on the man's face, he had likely been unaware that he and the Lieutenant were even close friends, as was true for most of his staff that did not work daily in their combined presence, but he was without sympathy for his ignorance. "Yet instead, you have returned alone while she remains injured, and stranded as now the only other currently living member of the team that beamed down with you."

"Can you tell if she's alright? Is she at least conscious?" Kirk asked.

"She… is." He took a breath, and then another, attempting to reach to her through their bond, but only her strongest feelings were registering to him. Fear, and pain. "I am quite sure she is concussed, but her injuries are not life threatening." He felt a tug from her, and dropped his eyes closed while a dim image of what seemed to be a small cave, and a string of flashing words screamed at him in his mind. "She is hidden inside a rock formation, and is shouting."

"Shouting, what do you mean? Shouldn't she shut—shouldn't she be quiet? Is she in pain?"

"Yes, though this is not the cause of her present consternation. She is asking what the 'fuck' happened to the Lieutenant Commander."

Kirk's eyebrows shot up at his use of the mimicked word, but he did not give it further attention other than to shift toward Walsh. "If I find out from her report that you abandoned a fellow officer to save your own ass, you're done. I've already taken a beating from Mr. Spock here, and I'm not above claiming temporary blindness if he decides round two is on _you_, so you'd better know where she is."

He was inclined to agree until he heard a faint static.

"Uhura...bridge… Uhura to bridge…requesting immediate…"

He all but ran to the communications board. He began rerouting the transmission in an endeavor to bounce it off of the interfering materials without losing her entirely, but was unsuccessful. He jammed the small receptor into his ear, rapidly typing manual programming until the squealing feed back had finally cleared to its accustomed hum.

"Lieutenant Uhura, what is your location?" He heard a series of clicks that was indicative of attempted speech through subspace transmission, but nothing more. "Lieutenant Uhura, what is your location?" Nothing.

He tried a further two times before the click opened to the sound of her voice.

"Spock! Get me out of here!"

His relief was shared with his captain, who punched the panel on the arm of his chair to alert the medical team for receiving. The moment he was given confirmation her coordinates had been transmitted for direct beam to the med bay, he sprinted there to find Dr. McCoy's hands already flying over her. He ignored his demand to clear the room, stepping up to the bio bed to find her vitals reporting dangerously abnormal as he reached for her hand, but as their fingers connected, he ripped his hand away after being given a massive electric shock. He steadied himself on the wall, her back bowing off the bed while her slightly bloodied face twisted in pain before he felt her heart flutter.

And stop.

The red alarm on the bio bed screeched through the room, and his lungs ceased to function.

"Nyota?" He was barely audible even to himself. He felt as though he might faint.

A hand to the middle of his chest stopped him from moving toward her any further.

"Spock, now! If you're not leavin', then get outta my way."

His ears were ringing, his vision dotted with black spots, and his breaths were shallow and gasping as they resuscitated the only person he had left in the world. He felt the tether that bonded them through any distance, splintering, micro cords breaking off in blinding pain until he could hardly feel anything at all when something wet trickled down his face. He reached up to his nose, and his stained green fingers were the last thing he saw before darkness swallowed him.


	2. Chapter 2

_He was nervous._

_She had used his couch as a secluded place away from her dorm room many times before, but innocently studying for finals in the warmth of his apartment had swiftly developed to much more. They had been "seeing each other" as she had called it—a strange colloquialism given that they saw each other nearly every day—for 2 months and 4 days, and they had had this conversation._

_Until his bond breaking ceremony, he was still promised to another._

_The proven and admitted fact that she had not waited for him would not corrupt his moral standing to his principals… no matter how much he wished to forget them in every moment they spent alone._

_She straddled him in his lap with her hands fisted in his hair, her lips feverish and everywhere, and her examinations long forgotten. They had been this way for several minutes before his rapid breathing began to show the tingling symptoms of over-oxygenation, but instead of allowing this session to come to an end as she normally did when he pulled her hands away, she wormed them between where their bodies were most connected to undo the zipper on his uniform trousers. He broke his lips from hers to shake his head in the negative, but with her fingers coming to wrap around the evidence that he did not truly wish for her to listen, she was not dissuaded. She had slid to her knees on the carpet in front of him before he found his conviction again, his chest heaving endlessly._

_"Nyota. No."_

_"Please? I want to be with you. It's only just a couple days away, what does it matter what happens now?"_

_"Contrarily, this is precisely why it matters. The ceremony is only 3 days from now, but asking me not to wait for this is essentially asking me to be a more dishonorable man than I have already been. Is this what you wish?"_

_She took in a breath, and sighed, her mouth pulling up in a sad smile. "No, Spock. It's not."_

_The ceremony itself had been almost uneventful. He had bristled at the sight of Stonn, his would be beloved's newly intended, loitering stoically outside of the doors to the temple, but was told later that this was instinctual with his bond to her weak, yet still active. She had apparently aimed to be bonded to him in the mere moments following the separation, and although he was not alone in the knowledge that this was quite inappropriate, he himself did also have someone to whom he wished to be bonded the very minute she would agree._

_He was instructed to remain on Vulcan for the next 2 days in the unlikely event of any maleffect, but as their bond was one of simple tradition, he had been well, and was grateful to spend this time in his childhood home. He and Nyota had agreed that they would abstain from contacting each other during this time, but it was beginning to wear on him with that part of his mind free, yet suddenly empty in a way that it had not been since he was 7 years old. It was as relieving as it was unsettling._

_On the warp shuttle returning him to Earth, he had reached for his communicator to call her 4 times before thinking again, and replacing his hands in his lap, stowing away the desire to be updated on all things her, which was illogically intense considering he could see her in less than an hour if he wished._

_It was late into the evening when he had finally stepped off the hoverbus that stopped just outside of his apartment block, and he could no longer hold back the need to hear her voice. She answered before the first tone had even rung through, as he walked briskly through the quiet grounds of his complex._

_"Spock? Hey."_

_"Hello, Nyota."_

_"How was your trip? Where are you? Well, you're… calling, so I guess you're at least back on Earth, right?"_

_"I am."_

_"Good. Great. I, uh… how did everything go?"_

_"As expected. I am no longer bonded."_

_"Right. Good. Or—well, I mean… nothing, it's okay. How do you feel?"_

_"I… am uncertain. I admit, it is a bit off-putting."_

_"How do you mean?"_

_"It is difficult to explain, though it is likely not in the manner in which you may be assuming, as I am not regretful of having done it. In fact, I am relieved."_

_"No, I didn't… think you were regretting it, but I'm glad. I just... well I…"_

_"Yes?"_

_"I just…" He triggered the door to his apartment, and to his immediate surprise, found her standing on the other side of it. She was in a pair of soft looking sleep wear, her hair hanging low down her back and over her shoulder, and though he had of course not forgotten the way she looked to him, he was arrested by just how unfailingly beautiful she truly was with her lip caught in her teeth, and these interminably long days between them. "Missed you."_

_He closed his communicator, and took a slow step toward her, enough for the door to slide closed behind him, but she did not move. He took hers from her hand to set them both on the small table in his hallway, and her anxious expression was washed away when he pushed a strand of hair behind her rounded ear, allowing for just a moment the backs of his fingers to trail down the velvet smooth skin at the side of her neck before gripping it lightly in his palm. He could not help it. He felt the corners of his lips tugging high upward at her vastly characteristic forwardness in being there, at his now completely unnecessary self-doubt, at all of the things he had done deemed so illogical or unforgivable by so many of his people still having led him to his greatest achievement and joy in her. He was sure. She would see him in all ways, forever, and so he did not attempt to subdue his features, and felt a very playful spark through his fingertips still pinned to the back of her neck. He crushed his lips to hers, his hands running down her perfect body to her thighs that he used to hoist her up and around his waist. The spark he felt traveled all the way up his forearm, and through his chest over and over, as he walked them forward to his bed chamber, until his arm began to feel numb. He laid her down across the tightly tucked sheets, tugging at the thin bottoms concealing her, and she hummed, her fingers finding their preferred place in his hair at the crown of his head. He took her wrists and lifted them above her so his hands were free to roam her flat stomach, and downward, her hips shifting to bring him closer to where she wanted him to be. His nerves were electrified, every ending burning for her touch while she undid the clasp of his belt. He ran his thumb slowly across the soft folds at her center, and her head pressed back into the pillow, as she gripped his length._

_"Spock."_

_"Yes?" He did not look up from where he had pushed her shirt up enough to plant a kiss between her breasts. His heart was thundering unevenly in his side to the point that it was nearly painful, but he ignored it, trailing his lips as far down her torso as he could reach without her needing to move her hand from that part of his anatomy that needed her most._

_"Wake up."_

_"I am not asleep." The sparks were turning to full shocks, and his pulse gave a stuttering beat before quickening doubly._

_"Spock, wake up!"_

He bolted upright, his lungs on fire, and he squeezed his eyes shut at the harsh, unnatural light that blinded him. A hypo spray stung into his neck, as he was pushed by his shoulder back down onto whatever bed he seemed to be laid on, but he struggled against the strange contact.

"Spock, it's me! It's okay."

He blinked rapidly, squinting slightly, until his blurred vision adjusted, and the med bay materialized around him. He saw Dr. McCoy along with several nursing aides running a hand held vital scanner across his body before he turned to find Nyota sitting closely beside him with the signs of sleeplessness mixing with immense relief around her eyes, regenerated skin hiding a gash on her temple, and an IV drip sealed to the top of her hand. He could still smell the incent he burned in his old apartment, his vision having been so vivid that he was having trouble taking in his new surroundings. He reached his first three fingers out to her face, but pulled it back, a flash of her pain the last time he had touched her flitting through his brain. His memories of the incident were slowly returning, but were unclear of the minutes before he lost consciousness, and he willed himself to slow his breath.

"What has happened?" His voice was croaking.

"Well, Mr. Spock, to put it plain, you died." The good doctor's "bedside manner" as it was so called had certainly not been altered by his apparent decease.

"Nyota?"

She tangled her fingers in his, but he was dismayed to find the connection still horribly diminished. His head was pounding with it.

"Yeah, it's true. So did I, but nowhere near as long as you, and I was the one who got rocked."

"Got…" He was sure he had heard her use this expression before, but was unnervingly confused by it now.

"Nothing, Spock, I'm sorry. Don't worry about it." She set a light kiss to the top of his hand, and pressed it to her cheek, her sympathy for him mutedly passing through her touch.

"Do not apologize."

"Oh, Spock, I don't know what I would have—"

"Hate to interrupt." If he had worked alongside Leonard McCoy long enough, he would know that he did not. "But, Mr. Spock, do you know what day it is?"

"It is Thursday."

"Technically, it's Friday, it's after midnight, but you've been out for a couple hours, so we'll skip that. What's the current Stardate?"

"2258."

"I've just given you a good strong hypo spray. Are you still having any pain, and if so, where is it located?"

"My temporal lobe, but I do not believe pain medication will effect it."

"And why do you say that?" He shined a small flashlight in his pupils that exacerbated his aching head.

"It is a broken connection that is simply not in a place that can be reached by you."

"What?" Nyota squeezed his fingers, and pulled them to her, but this was not a conversation he wished to have in the company of others. He attempted to send her his intention to speak with her soon, but was achingly unaware if she had sensed it.

"Well you're not gettin' off that easy I can tell you that, but I'm gonna flip through a few photos that loosely relate to your function aboard the starship Enterprise, please state what they are." He was showed a slide of code written on his computer terminal on the bridge, a phaser set to stun, one set to kill, a flux generator, a dilithium crystal, and a dying quasar pulse, and he identified them accurately.

"Well... so far your vitals and oral tests look as good as they're gonna get for now, but you and the Lieutenant are on medical leave with no exceptions until we can figure out what these brain scans mean. I understand Vulcan psionic waves show patterns that humans don't have, and… well, Uhura is just plain concussed, but her temporal scans are even worse, and I don't like the looks of it."

"Doctor, if I may, I am quite aware of the issue that is causing such abnormality."

"By all means, spit it out th—"

"Actually… I think I am to." He turned his head to her, their eyes meeting for a brief moment before they flicked back over to McCoy. "Len, do you mind giving us a minute?"

His eyes narrowed and he glanced between them for 4 seconds before he pocketed his scanner, and tucked his PADD under his arm. He jammed his thumb over his shoulder, and his assistants filed out. "Fine, but I want answers, and if I find out he got out this bed for damn near anything, I'm strappin' him down when I get back, and if it means we have to scooch you right up on each other, Uhura lay down soon."

"Alright, alright, thanks Len." She watched him roll his eyes, and shuffle out of the room, and as soon as the door closed behind him, she lowered her voice. "Spock, what's going on? I'm literally holding onto your fingers, and I can barely hear you at all. What happened to our bond? This can't be normal."

"Unfortunately, it is. When one of a bonded pair dies, that bond is very suddenly broken. As we were both obviously able to be resuscitated, it is not entirely severed, but it is very weak, and will remain so until it is strengthened again."

"Will we need a healer?"

"I do not know, but it is likely. There are few of qualifying experience left."

"What happened to _you_, though? Like I said, I'm not surprised that our brain scans look off, but I don't remember anything after my beam up. According to McCoy's theory, the static from the surface of the planet was stored in my body until you touched me. They hadn't cut my body suit off before then, so you were just the first person to come into contact with my bare skin. I mean, he said you got shocked when you did, but that you just kinda dropped. Was it that bad?"

"It was not the electric shock that caused this, but rather the shock of our bond breaking so immediately. The death toll from Vulcan's destruction was amended to approaching 16,000 more than what was estimated from the initial implosion. This was due to that number of my people having experienced the same sudden loss of their bondmate, with younger and stronger bonds being the most affected."

"So what, you… you died because I did?"

"Essentially, yes."

He could see her beginning to piece together the implications of this, but had little in the way of comforting information to offer her. He would certainly need to call his father, or perhaps even his other self, though he had been hard pressed to locate a healer on New Vulcan who could perform their hybrid marriage, not to mention their current need for another, and he was quite sure this man was now dead. He felt useless without her constant presence in his mind, a nagging near soreness across every part of him that their linked fingers alone could not gratify, and absolutely not in their weakened state. He watched as she dropped her hands from him to scrub them over her face, and sigh, but she was quiet for a while, messaging his palm in a most pleasant way that made him feel dizzyingly tired given his need for healing rest. "Well… this is a very dangerous profession for that to be the case."

"To be sure. It is something I feel now I should have better prepared you for, and for this I am sorry."

She shook her head, her forgiving nature with him something that he would never assume, or take for granted, yet he felt undeserving of it in every occurence. His eyelids were as heavy as his limbs seemed to be, and it did not escape her notice, but he was not one to sleep while she remained awake. He did not have to think on it long, as she climbed into his bed next to him, her head on his chest, and tucked the thin blanket around them. He held her as tightly as he possibly could without completely flattening her against him, but could not shake the feeling of wrongness. She whispered to him, and her cool breath on his neck threatened to pull him under.

"Do you think a meld would help?"

"I will not risk causing you any further harm ahead of knowing to what extent you are injured."

"But soon, though. Promise?" She yawned into his shoulder.

"Nothing could be soon enough."


	3. Chapter 3

The following afternoon, he and Nyota were released from the med bay, but remained on leave until their Medical Officer deemed them refit for active duty. There was still much they could do from their respective PADDs, while they sat up together in their bed, and so he was not overly concerned by being unproductive, though he did long to return to his routine on the bridge. He could imagine finding many inconsistencies in his acting Chief Science Officers' work when he did, but he was receiving a daily summary report—and one slightly unwelcome visit to his quarters—from Jim.

"Mr. Spock! Thought I'd deliver this to you in person this time around for… science—you're looking alive today."

"Thank you, Captain."

"Is the lovely Lieutenant in?"

"Yes."

"Is she decent?"

"No." And the door to his quarters was closed.

He had yet to broach the subject of his recent injury to his father, and although his skin touched hers in some way at all times, save when they were each in his private bathroom, it was not enough. He needed desperately to reconnect that cord holding all of themselves as one being, but was illogically apprehensive of hearing a negative outcome. If they needed to revisit New Vulcan in order for their bond to be solidified again, it could be many years before that opportunity became available, and he worried for her continued safety with such abnormality showing in her brain scans. Although she had rested a great majority of the time they had been released, she was still cloudy and weak from the dosage of pain medication required to keep her comfortable, and he would have to admit to lingering discomfort in himself as well were anyone to ask after it.

The dull pain in his head was becoming distracting, so he clicked off his PADD, and laid it on his bedside table. She was deeply sleeping, curled up on her side with her feet pressed against his thigh, and she leaned back into him when he wrapped himself around her, his arm pulling her tight to his chest.

He could not help but to contemplate what could have been. Countless scenarios could easily have killed them both, regardless of whether one or the other were even aware that danger was imminent. It was not a guarantee that one of a bonded pair would die without the other, but he did not believe he could have survived without her, their bond stronger than even his parents' had been. He was sufficiently in control of his body's abilities to heal itself if the injury were insignificant, but in this instance there had been none, and he had died. He could not surmise that she would have faired better, as a human with no power over her own metabolic or brain functions, and it was no fault of her own. He would consider no life without his bonded, but perhaps he had been unwise to have put her in this position, as she had been quite correct in her assessment that this was too dangerous a profession for this number of unquantifiable possibilities meaning their untimely end. He wondered if his father had felt this way when he was bonded to his mother, as he had obviously always known that he would outlive her, or if when he was alone he had been similarly incapacitated when she had suddenly died. Sarek had not been quite so effected as he, but certainly he must have felt something. Nevertheless, it would do him no good to simply ponder when an explanation at the very least was attainable, and he was unable to stand the near silence of her in his mind any longer, so with a kiss to the back of her neck, he gently unwound himself from her to pad off to his living room terminal. It took several tones before his hail was answered, but in short order, the image of his father appeared on the screen, his fingers set in traditional greeting.

"My son. How are your current travels?"

"Most recently, they have been troubling. There is a subject on which I must speak with you rather urgently if you have no other pressing obligations to attend."

"You are not one to hail without reason, and I am unhindered. How may I be of assistance?"

"You may be in many ways. Mine and Nyota's bond has been severed."

His brows lifted infinitesimally. "I assume this was not purposeful."

"You are correct. To be brief, Nyota was injured on an away mission, and required resuscitation, and what I believe to be because of this, I did as well. When I felt our bond being torn, I lost consciousness."

"Her heart stopped completely?"

"Momentarily, yes."

"Can you feel that any connection remains?"

"Yes, though it is thin and very weak, and I cannot hear her thoughts at all. I have called to inquire what must be done to rectify this as soon as possible."

"I see." He steepled his fingers in front of him as he processed, but was otherwise as expressionless as he would be reading over a weather report. "I do not doubt your awareness of the danger this presents to your human bonded, Spock. Her mind is not as resilient as that of your own, and will require an experienced touch. Has she been experiencing any significant pain as a result of this?"

"Yes. Truthfully, I must confess to the same."

"Have you melded with her since this occurrence?"

"I did not believe it wise without having first spoken to you. She is minorly concussed, and our brain scans are not as they should be."

"I understand. While this was a forthright precaution, I would recommend that you attempt to meld with her yourself before other plans are made to involve a healer, as so few with this experience are available."

"So I have surmised. You are quite certain that this will not cause her any further injury?"

"I would not have suggested it if I were not." His tone took on a hint of a nostalgically chastising air that he had taken with him often when he was a child. He wondered if his mother's katra were having any influence on his relative openness, as he could sense it within his parental bonds, and found it rather comforting to envision. "You are her husband, therefore, there is likely no other who knows her more familiarly than yourself. I do not foresee any complications in reestablishing your bond on your own."

"A healer is not required for this?"

"To build an initial bond of marriage, yes. To strengthen one already existing, no. If you are sure that some part remains, a strong meld will be all that is needed. I can sense your pain, Spock, and can empathize with it."

"This was… in fact, another subject I intended to approach with you, though I do not wish to offend."

"There is, of course, no offense where none is taken."

He nodded loosely, and turned the words he wanted to say around in his mind for a moment. Commanding a majority human crew, he was used to having to phrase potentially invasive questions in a way that was considered most politically correct, and although his father appreciated bluntness, he was unsure if it were appropriate to unearth such a sensitive loss. He had elaborated on his feelings toward his mother's death while still aboard the Enterprise, but the information he had given him seemed far more relevant to his own predicament now. "How were you effected when Mother died? This had been equally sudden, if not more so. As I seem to have found, the bond between human and Vulcan can be as strong as any other, and I do not understand, given the indistinguishable differences, why I was so much more medically impacted. Did you experience similar physical pain?"

He almost wished he could take the words back, as the question was not exactly necessary, yet if he were saddened by this inquiry, he did not show it. Instead, he seemed serene in the mention of his lost beloved, his gaze a bit less focused than it had been before he had asked it. "As I have stated in the past, the bond between your mother and I was not solely one of simple circumstance, but at the time of her death, we had been bonded for 25 years. This is a significant portion of a humans life, which was known by that part of her brain that held this connection. While it was not necessarily weakened by its maturity, a regrettable amount of its time was spent at great distance, and this can change the way a marriage bond is preserved over that time. Furthermore, mine and your mother's familial bond to you is much stronger than that of you to ours, and this was inevitably what saved many from meeting a similar fate. This is something you will only come to understand when you link with a child of your own, if this is a future that you desire. That being said, you are one of a kind, and your bond is now equally unique. Please extended to her my regard, but meld with your wife, Spock, and all will be well in time. If you require any further assistance, I am available."

"Thank you, father. I will be sure to update you if anything more is discovered." He held out his hand in the ta'al, his father's willingness to speak on the subject obviously at its end, but he was immensely grateful, and bowed his head low. "Live long, and prosper."

"Peace, and long life, my son."

When the transmission ended, he sat back in his desk chair for a few minutes with his leg bouncing now more of excitement than anxiety. His wife was still sleeping, but the fact that he could only assume that this were the case made him all the more impatient to meld with her, and be all that they used to be. He truly missed the comfort of having her closer than anyone could possibly be to him, but did still harbor apprehension at potentially overwhelming her with it when he was finally able to place his fingers to those familiar points. He was quite sure that she would be just as elated as he when he delivered this news, and so he climbed into bed next to her again in order to simply hold her until she awoke.

He frequently found himself staring when she slept, as he did not need rest as often—though the medication Dr. McCoy had given him amplified this need of late—and this was no different. She rarely wore her hair down with her uniform requirement necessitating that she tie it, but when she was in bed he was free to card his hands through the smooth strands of it, and believed it must be perfect, though he had little to compare it to. The regularly loose gown she wore when she was especially tired clung to her under his sheets, and her feminine shape was a beautiful outline he could gaze upon indefinitely. Even the small things she considered to be blemishing, such as the scars she carried from various accidents throughout her life, or the freckles dotting her shoulders, were marks he would never contemplate the removal of. He sometimes wondered what she would look like, or how her core self would change when her perfect hair was gray, or her freckled skin wrinkled, but with each new woman she would become with age, he would meet her again… and be happy. Being quite literally endangered, he did not feel as though he needed to hide this fact any longer. With her, he was very happy. Although their timelines greatly differed, perhaps he would indeed grow to be more like Spock Prime in his own later years.

He spent this time lightly meditating on his introspect, and it was nearly two hours later when he felt her stirring and groaning into her pillow. She turned over to bury her face into his neck, her leg thrown over him in his most preferred way, as he awoke and adjusted to accommodate her more comfortably. He peppered light kisses to her face, and rubbed small circles on her back where he could reach it before pulling back enough to meet her drowsy eyes, unable to withhold his conversation any further.

"I spoke to my father."

"Really? Like just now?" Her voice was rough and almost childlike, and his lips quirked up at the irrelevance of her question.

"No, not precisely just, but very recently as it were."

"How did it go? Why didn't you wake me up first? I would have sat with you."

"There was no need, my wife, though he sends you his best wishes. As a matter of fact, it was very enlightening."

"Yeah I'm sure. Was it just Sarek?"

"Yes, it was." His father had remarried a short time ago, his work on New Vulcan being much easier with a partner, but he had yet to meet her, on screen or otherwise.

"What did he say? Do we have to try and find a healer?"

"No, we do not."

"Damn it, Spock, just tell me what's going on, please. It's bad news, isn't it? I just know it's bad, you're being weird."

"Why do you think that?" He was practically itching to inform her that this news was not at all unfavorable, but he could not resist teasing her meanwhile, as his fingers inched down to her backside.

"Because we're just not that lucky, and you're being a lot more... demonstrative than usual, so I just know you're trying to prep me to be sad, or something because, I love you, but you do that sometimes, and I wish you would just tell me, so I don't just worry about it forever until you do."

This gave him pause, and his hand stilled. He had long ago made a point to be more communicative in his feelings where she was regarded, but he had not considered it necessary since their marriage with those emotions pouring out through their bond to her as long as they lived. Perhaps, this had been a misstep on his part, as he had before felt as though he sometimes took advantage of her acceptance of his inhumanity, and so he spoke to her softly, her head cradled in the crook of his arm. "Nyota, although it would behoove me to point out the illogic of luck, of course we are lucky. We are alive when we closely were not, and at some instance in these lives, we both made a single decision that led us to Starfleet, and therefore to each other. Something as effortless as a common interest with you has pointed me to a solace in life that I did not believe I would ever have found. These last days, we have simply had to navigate our relationship in a more human way, as we did when we first began. This is certainly more difficult now that we have experienced what it means to be parted, yet never apart, but I do not wish for you to think as though my feelings for you have changed, or that my physical affections are indicative of bad news only because you cannot feel them without touch and hear them without words. More than I am anything, I am in love with you, Nyota. I have always been. For this, I am lucky."

She looked up at him with her softest expression, and ran her hand over his cheek before pressing her lips gingerly to his. They had been married for two years, and together for two beyond that, but the heat that sprang through him when she did this was as immediate as the very first time. He instantly deepened it, his arms encircling her thin waist while he kissed and kissed and kissed her. Her tongue slid over his bottom lip while he pulled the sheets back from her to run his hand up the side of her leg draped over his hip, and finding nothing but skin under her gown as high up as it could go had him swelling tight. She raised her arms for him to strip it from her and toss it to the floor, the short moment his lips were not touching her seeming too long, but he drew them wet down her neck, and her knees pressed into his sides, as he neared the soft curve of her breast. He dragged the flat of his tongue along the underside of it, a spot which he knew quickened her breath before closing his mouth around her nipple. Her hands twisted in his hair, her chest raising off the bed, but he did not stay long, his desire of her relentless, and he positioned his head between her legs after ripping his shirt over it, the fabric scratching across his fevered skin. She let out a shivering whine when his mouth connected with the unbelievably soft center held only for him, and it effected his own directly. His fingers dug into her thighs while he worked steady circles into her, having held her close to a high edge as long as he was able until she was panting and shaking and spent, and if this was all he could accomplish this night, he would be satisfied.

When he felt her quivering slow to a stop, he kissed the top of her flat stomach as he eased her legs back down to the bed, but before he could climb far over her, she shoved him bodily onto his back, and tugged at the cotton of his pants. He let her pull them from him, and watched with heavy lids while she pressed her lips down his body to his throbbing tip. He gripped the cover at his sides, having made the mistake of grabbing her head a bit too roughly in the past, while she swirled her tongue around him for a moment in that way that made it impossible for him to stay still before swallowing him entirely. His effort was monumental in keeping his hips from jerking and gagging her by mistake, and if he could feel embarrassed, he would be by the near noise that slipped from his throat, his reflex in these areas too slow to catch it from escaping with his hand clasped over his mouth. When her slick fingers tightened around his base and slid upward in time with her bobbing head, his hand flew to her shoulder, and he pulled at her as lightly as he could manage, his voice trembling with the rest of him.

"Nyota, stop. Stop."

"Why?" She took her mouth from him, but her delicate hand did not quit its venture, and although he gave her a half truth, he was quite sure she knew 'why.'

"I do not wish for you to overexert yourself."

"Is that so?"

"It… is." She was certainly teasing him, and he supposed it was only fair.

"I'm sure I'll be just fine, my husband, but I guess I could relax a bit, if you insist." Her movement slowed to an agonizing pace, and his eyes fluttered and rolled back, his head pressed hard into his pillow. He did not attempt to quell the groan she pulled from him with every pass of her hand over his hypersensitive skin, and he wondered if he would ever grow accustomed to how easily she wrested from him the command over himself he had spent his entire life working to acquire. He had had to stop her too early on many occasions, the sensation too much to take, and this was beginning to seem as though he may add to that count. "Tell me what your father said."

He rarely ever used his strength against her, but when she ran the pad of her thumb firmly up the vein that pulsed along the side of him, he gripped the tops of her arms and threw her under him, the squeal she let out and the bounce of her body only serving to urge him deeper into the imperativeness he felt to be buried within her. His lips were clumsy on hers while he positioned himself at her entrance, but though she was clawing at his hips to bring him closer, he held back to lift her gaze with his hand to her throat, and whispered against her mouth.

"You are certain this is what you wish?"

"Spock, are you fucking kidding me, just—"

"My father is sure we can meld at any time." He watched her lips part, and her eyes widen before the expression morphed into one he waited for each time he slid into her, the same shaking breath blowing onto his cheek while he worked a pace alike the one she had so often used to torture him. Her breasts pressed themselves to his chest, and his hand bore down solid on her neck with as much purpose as was possible without constricting her airway beyond pleasurable effect. "Given all that has surpassed," he drew his tongue leisurely over her lips. "I want to be beyond doubt that you still desire to be my wife."

She whimpered into his ear, "I do. I do. Spock, I can't take it. I want you back."

Needing no further encouragement, he pounded her into their mattress, the volume of their activity nearly requiring sound proofing, as his hand fisted in her hair to hold her steady to him. He trapped his arm under the back of her knee, and the extended angle had the painfully swelling head of his member bumping into that spot inside of her that kept her wailing with every thrust of his hips inward. She raked her nails down his back, and he huffed into her ear at the small pain he greatly enjoyed, but no matter how many positions he flipped her into, or how long they stayed this way, or how close he came to that sightless heat, he could not let go. His skin was flushed and prickling, his breath harsh with his need as he reached his hand to her face, and with no hesitation, she turned into it while his fingers aligned at her temple.

He would never crave a feeling more than what it was like to be sucked away from space and time, and down toward her most intimate thoughts. His experience in this regard was rather limited, but he had never had sexual intercourse without the use of telepathy, and yet, in any other, he had found more than a few unsavory opinions of his alienness in their minds that had turned him quite off of human women. Now however, he found only gratitude, pleasure, and a fierce love that he mirrored in a way incomparable. He saw in her memories himself standing in his lecture hall, at his bridge station, in his kitchen, in his robes at their shared altar, and in his shower, and clips of his voice speaking at any meeting, on his communicator, over the intercom, and in her ear as he moved above her. Every thought she had was a flashing image of him. She thought him perfect, and with each thought they shared, and every sigh that passed between them, he felt their splintered bond regenerating like an old rope being braided back with its own strands again.

He felt himself pulse as her fingers tightened in his hair, his breath stuttering into her neck while his ribs were crushed between her legs, and he was lost in a purgatory of reality that went on and on. He could feel nothing, and yet everything of value this world had to offer him, and illogical nonetheless, he wished they could stay in this sensation or even just this bed for the rest of time.

They had ended on their side, and he was panting heavy, but he did not wish to move through the sedation of his limbs, so he did not, instead choosing to clutch her to his chest, held beautifully warm inside her mind and body. He tipped his head back for her, her kisses feather light to his neck, and he hummed against her as he pushed and pulled at their newly secured bond. He could feel her contentment clearly, his pain gone along with hers, but considering most Vulcan marriages were arranged by pure necessity, he pondered the true meaning of the term 'bond-sickness' while they laid together fully entangled. He found it quite strange—though far less so having experienced it to near death—that a people such as his would have normalized and even spoken openly about the discomfort and longing that comes with the loss of one's spouse. His father had obviously been correct that he would not yet understand how the bond to one's own child could spare a person from this affliction, but he knew his mother's love for him had been viciously powerful, and if there could be anything more so than his own to Nyota, he supposed it was not unbelievable that this could save either one of them if the other were to die. He wondered how much like her it would look. If it would have her caramel skin, or his slanted brow bone, or her waving hair, or his pointed ear and sharp teeth. He had never so much as held an infant. No matter their recent incident, he found himself not opposed to the thought.

He heard his name called, and his eyes brightened when he realized that it was not spoken aloud. He shifted to look down at her, and found a very familiarly amused expression in her features.

"That was an oddly quick change of thought, babe. But we're not having kids yet."

"Why is that?"

"Because for one, there's not a xeno-geneticist on this ship, and two, I'm not about to have our first baby raised this close to Jim Kirk."

"I understand. I was merely pondering the idea. Having said that, I do not believe it would be quite as detrimental to our child's health and development as you seem to think to have someone such as the captain involved in its early life."

Her brows shot up into her hairline, and she stared at him for a moment before simply shaking her head. "I think you're just in post-orgasm glow, or whatever, because I am not about to let that man ruin our son into a womanizing maniac, no matter how good at his job he can be most days."

"What makes you so certain it will be a boy?"

"I don't know. Just a feeling, I guess." He nodded, but did not give it more thought, and she winced as he pulled out of her to stand next to the bed. She pouted, reaching for him, but let out a gasp and a squeal as he swung her up over his shoulder to carry them off to their bathroom, as naked as the day they themselves were born. "Spock, put me down! What are you doing?" She slapped at his back, but he ignored her, and did not slow his gate.

"I believe a shower is in order, my new bride, and seeing as how you seem prefer the wasteful use of running water, I would think it quite reprehensible to complete this task separately."

"Is that right?" She giggled while he slid her down his grasp to equal his height.

"I have been informed by many that I am always right."

She rolled her eyes, and laughed at him, her smile beaming, and her presence within him shining uninhibited throughout his very soul.


End file.
